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View Full Version : Theorycrafting Dexterity-based Tempests - FLF (First Life Friendly!)



MysticRhythms
12-18-2015, 04:44 PM
So I've been playing a pure Human Ranger-20 Tempest of late and wanted to start up a thread to theorycraft on optimal build choices.

Mine is a first-lifer so it's only 32 build points. I'll describe what I did along with some options I ended up not selecting that could still be good.

The idea is to be a Dexterity-based Tempest. My reason for doing Dexterity is that it fixes what was once my biggest problem with the Tempest Ranger - MAD (Multi Attribute Dependency). My old build needed Strength, Dexterity, Constitution and Wisdom. The bow and Finessed weapons needed Dexterity for attack bonus and Strength for damage bonus. It made it hard to maximize DPS without being a glass cannon (this was in the pre-PRR days).

Well now my build uses Strength as a dump stat with all of the changes to the Tempest and Deepwood Stalker enhancement lines. Dexterity is king. It gives me attack, damage and now contributes to my AC and Reflex saves in a meaningful way. it works with ranged and melee attacks and takes so much clunk (in my opinion) out of building melee-based rangers. Yes I'm aware of some excellent builds here that still use Strength with Khopeshes and likely those builds are better at DPS than my idea.

My thought is to keep AC, Dodge bonus, saving throws, PRR/MRR/Evasion meaningful so that the Tempest can sometimes take a few punches from elite mobs and survive a little longer. My character started out as a first-lifer with very little gear. I had the two raid boxes from back in the day, so I decided to shoot for dual-wielding Balizarde and Celestia. that would give me a decent weapon set that I could access as low as level 23. I had a friendly guildmate craft me a pair of Wounding-of-Puncturing rapiers with Red augment slots for level 20.

So the build basics:

Human (could go Elf, Halfling, Shadar Kai)
Strength 8
Dexterity 16
Constitution 14
Wisdom 14
Intelligence 12
Charisma 14
All level-ups go into Dexterity

I kept Charisma meaningful because I knew I'd be cross-classing Use Magic Device so I could do fun things in Epic levels. I prefer the broader point usage of stats because I want Wisdom and Constitution to be a little higher so my saving throws are better. I'd much rather have the extra skill point than the higher Strength. Now for those who, like me, are on First Lifers and don't want to spend the DDO points on +6 tomes (I did - I intended to play this character for a long time, so I bought a Supreme Ability Tome and a Greater Tome of Epic Learning). You might want to spend your points differently if you don't want to get tomes.

Selected Feats:

I call this the Aragorn build because it pretty much does what you expect a Ranger to do - fight with two weapons and shoot a bow). I consider the asterisked feats to be mandatory.

*Weapon Finesse (needed to get the attack bonus with rapiers)
*Dodge
*Mobility
*Spring Attack
*Improved Critical(Piercing)
Improved Critical(Ranged)
*Precision
Point Blank Shot

Now ... my intention was to be able to go with Tempest Two-Weapon Fighting styles most of the time but to also be fairly competent with a bow since I knew I'd be taking some Darkwood Stalker enhancements anyway. I wanted to maximize my defenses, so I plan on emphasizing AC, PRR/MRR and dodging, hence the Spring Attack chain. As other people have said, Rangers can be very flexible in their feat choices. If you want to ditch the bow, you can probably get rid of Point Blank Shot and Improved Critical(Ranged) and replace those feats with two of Quicken Spell, Empowered Healing Spell and Maximize Spell metamagic feats. This build will have a decent Wisdom which translates to a good number of spell points, so Metamagics make sense. I did try one iteration with:

The Healer build
-Point Blank Shot
-Improved Critical(Ranged)
+Maximize Spell
+Quicken Spell

It made me more survivable in some Epic Elite content but I found I missed the extra punch with the bow (in some instances, I liked getting into Fury of the Wild and dropping a Manyshot with a damage boost and then Adrenalizing it to one-shot red-names.

Another option I have not tried is:

The Chop-Socky Tank
-Point Blank Shot
-Improved Critical(Ranged)
+Combat Expertise
+Whirlwind Attack (I already have the Dodge chain)

I find this build can be pretty "tanky" in Epic levels, especially when you are running in Unyielding Sentinel and the Combat Expertise would help in those cases. The only reason I hesitate is that the ddowiki says Whirlwind Attack doesn't work with weapons. If that material in the wiki is dated, I may try this on my next life just to see what Dance of Death does with Whirlwind Attack. I also want to see if Combat Expertise is worth the feat slot.

Another thing you could do is to ditch the Dodge chain and try some mixture of the metamagics and maybe other melee enhancers like Weapon Focus. The real beauty of the Ranger is that you get so many free feats that support TWF and Ranged combat already.

So here's how I spent my enhancements:


Enhancements (80 AP)


Deepwood Stalker (32 AP)


Far Shot, Sneak Attack, Exposing Strike, Advanced Sneak Attack, Mark of the Hunted


Favored Defense III, Increased Empathy II
Survivalist, Improved Weapon Finesse, Melee/Range Power Boost III
Survivalist, Favored Hunter III, Dexterity
Survivalist, Killer III, Merciful Shot, Dexterity



Tempest (48 AP)


Shield of Whirling Steel, Tempest, Graceful Death, Deflect Arrows, Whirlwind, Dervish


Improved Defense III, Whirling Blades
Improved Parry III, Whirling Blades, Sprint Boost I
Storm Dancer, Whirling Blades, Dexterity
Storm Tempest, Elaborate Parry III, The Growing Storm III, Whirling Blades, Dexterity
Dual Perfection, Evasive Dance III, Cuts: Many Cuts III, Whirling Blades, Dance of Death III




I focused heavily on the Tempest and pulled in as much from Deepwood Stalker as I could to qualify for Mark of the Hunted. The "filler" enhancements are Merciful Shot and Increased Empathy II in Deepwood Stalker. I don't find anything in Tempest to be filler. I did take the Sprint Bosot in Tempest for versatility. Damage Boost would have been an excellent choice as well, obviously, so that's something you could tweak. Notice that I focused on building up my PRR, Dodge and Evasion. If you want to ditch most of the defensive stuff, you can easily back off on what is spent in Tempest and move some to Human for more Boosts/Healing AMplification or maybe consider Harper Agent and Know the Angles.

This is where I might like some input from everyone. I like my build. It's very survivable even on Epic Elite before I got my first epic Past Life. I'm not averse to takign suggestions, however.

Some things I've considered:

1) Switch to scimitars so I can ditch Weapon Finesse and take a metamagic feat. The only thing stopping me from doing this is that I intended to use Balizarde and Celestia as my main weapons since I had no gear. I'd reconsider this now.
2) Ditch some of the defensive stuff and get more INT so I can Know the Angles in Harper. I don't know what to ditch first if I do this.
3) Skip Tempest Tier 5's and try Deepwood Stalker Tier 5s? I really like Dance of Death and every single one of the Tempest Tier 5's,. I do think that I might try an Arcane Archer/Deepwood Stalker that would use DWS Tier 5's and be4 more of a ranged character in one of my forthcoming TRs whenever they happen.

This is already a long post so I'll stop right here. I intend to discuss which Epic Destinies I used for my first epic life and what I think are pretty optimal choices in the Martial and Primal Spheres.

This build does hit hard. Especially against its favored enemies. I chose Elf over Construct for the early Epic levels and all the drow.

Lycurgus
12-22-2015, 12:14 AM
There's no reason to take weapon finesse. You get dex to hit and damage from the tempest cores.

Sunnie
12-22-2015, 03:52 PM
There's no reason to take weapon finesse. You get dex to hit and damage from the tempest cores.
Only with light weapons, which rapiers ain't afaik. It'd work with scimitars since they get treated as light weapons by the same Tempest core.

And I don't think Dance of Death would do anything with Whirlwind. I'm pretty sure DoD only applies to normal attacks, so not to cleaves or other attacks with special animations.